Articles on hotel initiatives to welcome pets into hotels always prove popular among our subscribers and readers.
We published an article along such lines only two weeks ago.
It featured a photo of a dog, a Labrador, I think, sitting on a blanket on a bed.
Now, I would not have written this opinion piece five years ago, for then to describe me as a “pet person” would have been very widely off the mark. Then a stray cat we called Pieball — she is black and white, thus, pied, and she was a small ball of fur when we first found her — entered my and my wife Francesca’s life, and everything changed.
Mind you, cats aren't often included in hotels’ overtures to pets.
I also would not have mentioned this if I had not received a news release from the United Arab Emirates.
Whenever I see a hotel pet policy, it always ends up with the idea I could follow it if I elected to bring only one well-behaved dog.
This is outright cat-ism, or at best a cat-astrophe.
But the emirate of Ras al Khaimah has just released a marketing campaign around a cat, Leo, which lived in the destination and supposedly roamed freely around its hotels and attractions.
The campaign has roped in Raki Phillips, CEO of the Ras Al Khaimah Tourism & Development Authority, who has said that “the decision to choose a cat character for the Ras Al Khaimah’s latest marketing campaign is a strategic one that is based on consumer insights, brand alignment and research that shows ad campaigns featuring mascots are 37% better positioned for greater market share.”
Wow, pet treats all around!
I explained this thinking to Pieball and Super-black, our other cat and one of Pieball’s male kittens. They meowed in a fashion that I took to mean neither was fully sure this reasoning would stand up to scrutiny if they padded into a lobby to check in.
Pieball’s other kittens are Black; White; Super-white; Brown and Super-brown, all names based on their coloration and the need at 3:30 a.m. to tell our vet how we would keep a record of their health and weight gain. I mentioned all this purely to get their names in the pages of Hotel News Now for future posterity.
The Ras al Khaimah program underlines all of this when it states: “A cat is the embodiment of unparalleled relaxation and the perfect symbol. … Just like [Leo], visitors to Ras Al Khaimah can feel free and relaxed when they vacation in this Emirate.”
There you have it. I take that as an invitation.
Hotels with the luxury of a lot of space probably can cater to pets better than an urban hotel squeezed between other buildings, although searching online for “cat hotel” mostly brings up not hotels, but catteries.
I assume this is because dogs’ habits tend to be different to those of cats, and I leave it at that.
Francesca and I have taken the cats to self-catering accommodations in the U.K., and we have found one or two we really love, but truth be told they would rather stay at home, I think.
That said, I am sure they would love Ras al Khaimah.
If you are a hotelier, especially one representing a brand, I would love to hear from you, especially as coming out of COVID-19, pets have become more important to more people.
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